Reinventing Our Lives at 40

renovation

One of the many reasons we were drawn to Quiet Farm was its collection of rather ramshackle yet usable outbuildings. Since keeping chickens for eggs (and entertainment) was always a top priority, renovating the chicken house was definitely high on our project list.

The ‘before’ photo, in bleakest winter.

The original nest boxes on the far wall indicate that this may previously have been used as a henhouse.

Although the chicken house was moderately sturdy, it definitely called for renovation before we brought hens home. The roof required replacing, the foundation needed to be defended against predators and the interior demanded a good cleaning.

With the roof removed and much of the junk cleaned out.

Repurposed corrugated steel panels ready for the roof. They’re weighed down with rocks so they don’t blow away.

Our goal with all of our renovation projects is to salvage and repurpose materials whenever possible, and to learn something as we do it. It would be much easier to accomplish everything by constantly buying new supplies at the big-box home improvement stores, but that level of excessive consumption doesn’t fit with our lifestyle and typically stifles creativity, as well. We’re trying hard to do as much as we can with what we have on hand.

How to install a chicken house roof, in four easy steps.

After removing the existing roof, we laid plywood sheets, covered them with tarpaper, then reinstalled the metal panels. Here’s a pro tip: don’t try to do this on a windy day; we nearly donated all of our roofing materials to our neighbors. Thus far the roof has remained perfectly watertight, but winter will be the real test, especially if we have the heavy snowfall we experienced last year.

Trenching the chicken house to bury wire.

There are many, many creatures here who would love a fresh chicken dinner, so keeping the chickens both dry and safe is essential. Because raccoons, foxes, skunks and whistle pigs can all dig, we trenched around the house and buried wire fencing about a foot deep. The fencing is also secured two feet up the walls of the house.

Just some of the hardware discovered during this project.

Our roost, built from repurposed lumber.

Nearly finished!

We bought old windows from a nearby vintage shop and installed them to provide both light and ventilation. It’s actually much more difficult to keep chickens cool than warm; their feathers provide natural insulation and they don’t sweat like humans do, so it’s imperative that they have access to fresh air when it’s hot. On the other hand, cold, damp drafts can make them sick, so the house needs to be pretty airtight during winter.

All done except for paint. The lush growth and gorgeous light proves this is a spring photo.

We collected rocks (we have plenty!) and stacked them up on top of the wire mesh around the base of the house for an additional layer of protection against digging predators. The old wire spools and branches provide shade and shelter for the birds.

Twelve chickens, tucked up snugly on the top roost bar.

Chickens like to sleep on an elevated perch; they’re descended from jungle fowl, so they’d naturally sleep in trees. Our roost has four bars, but invariably most of the birds end up on the top rung, with one or two lower-ranking birds on the next rung down. Remember, pecking order is a very real thing, and every chicken knows exactly where they fit in the hierarchy.

Freshly painted with a new coat of sharp red paint! (Look closely to the right of the house and you can see where the paint sprayer exploded.)

Our final task was to give the house a fresh coat of paint, both for aesthetics and to protect the aged wood from our harsh weather. Our trusty paint sprayer didn’t like the thick exterior paint or the extreme summer temperatures, so there’s quite a lot more red paint “decorating” the area than we’d like. Nevertheless, the refurbished chicken house is keeping our birds safe, protected and dry and hopefully will for years to come.

Next up on the project list: lots of canning and preserving, plus installing our beetle-kill floors in the master bedroom and closet. Always something in the works here on Quiet Farm!

Spring is truly here and the Quiet Farm project list expands daily! The weather has been unusually warm, so much so that everyone is concerned about our wonderful mesa snowpack melting too quickly and flooding the creeks. This sunny (and windy) week alone, we received deliveries of soil, lumber, fencing and concrete. We hauled railroad ties, hefted 80-pound bags of Quikrete, wheelbarrowed soil, hammered in T-posts and more. Our farm muscles are coming along nicely, and we’re trying hard to remember to apply sunscreen and drink enough water. When people say farming is hard work, they aren’t kidding – especially when you don’t yet own a tractor.

Despite the snow on the ground, spring is in the air. We’re entering the freeze-thaw cycle (also known as mud season) and our quarter-mile driveway is the worse for it, but all around us, things seem to be softening and readying for growth. We’re excited for spring, friends. This winter has offered much more moisture than last year’s punishing drought, and we’re looking forward to seeing how our fields regenerate once the snows have disappeared for good.

One of our favorite winter activities has been watching for wildlife across our land; the persistent snow has made tracks easy to see. We’ve spotted coyotes, foxes, rabbits, raccoons, ground squirrels and of course our nemesis, deer. We are trying hard to learn this land, to know what lives here now and what was here before us so we can figure out how to best live in harmony.

The first time we walked into our old house, the one we sold last year, we fell hard for the woodburning stove and the built-in bookshelves. We don’t have a woodburning stove here at Quiet Farm – hell, we don’t even have a furnace – but we have the opportunity to make our own custom built-in bookshelves. And so we did.

Hi there! Is it cold and snowy where you live? We think everyone in the world is getting lots of snow except us, but really that’s fine. It has been remarkably chilly, though, so most of our activities and projects are indoors these days.

Nom nom nom.

We are loving our fall CSA share; each week we receive delicious vegetables that we’d never find in our grocery store. Those sweet, colorful carrots were devoured raw; the delicata squash was roasted and served over the arugula, and the tatsoi went into a spicy stir-fry with local pork. We highly recommend joining a CSA in your community if you have the option.

Like a Roomba, only better.

Our new pet looks like a Star Wars extra, but when you have this much painting to do, a sprayer makes things a whole lot easier. There is a learning curve with a paint sprayer, but once you’ve mastered set-up and clean-up it saves hours. Pro tip: do not skip the cleaning and storage instructions. If you store the sprayer without cleaning it properly, you will regret it. Trust us on this.

Looking west down our land, with the Grand Mesa peeking out in the back.

Autumn has thus far been quite fickle here at Quiet Farm; we’ve had blue-sky days of close to eighty degrees, and we’ve had misty, rainy days filled with murky low clouds. We’ve had a couple of hard frosts, but no snow as yet.

These will be even more gorgeous once they’re back on our original doors.

As we’ve mentioned previously, we’re trying hard to maintain the original spirit of our 1901 home during our renovation. To that end, if it’s old and we can salvage it, we’ll do so. N has diligently hand-scraped layer upon layer of carelessly slopped paint off these doorknobs and plates; it’s a tedious project, to be sure, but the results are spectacular.

So much possibility here.

We’ve joined a local CSA this fall and are excited to share photos of our bounty each week. This first pick-up we received leeks, garlic, potatoes, daikon radish, spicy greens and celeriac (or celery root). We believe firmly in the CSA model and also believe that CSAs make everyone better cooks; you’re often compelled to use ingredients you’d never have selected at the grocery store. Hearty, warming fall soups, roasted vegetables and intriguing salads are on the menu at Quiet Farm this week.

The “before” photo of our light-filled sunroom, which will eventually be a home for plant starts and a sewing corner, too.

On the to-do list this week: install flooring in our sunroom. This is our first attempt at installing what everyone calls foolproof click-lock laminate. This room needs to be waterproof, dirt-proof and easy to clean, so we’re giving this wonder material a shot. We’ll report back on our successes and our failures learning opportunities, dear reader.

Atmospheric, no?

Up next: monumental painting projects (but we bought a sprayer!). More flooring. Stripping and refinishing vintage doors. Storing irrigation pipes for the winter. Never a dull moment around here, friends. Have a great week!

We are enjoying spectacular sunrises and sunsets here on the farm as the weather seems to settle comfortably into true fall. The days are crisp and the evenings are chilly – but we finally figured out our tricky gas stoves, so we’re staying toasty when we’re inside. We don’t have a furnace in our farmhouse, so we keep warm with the stoves plus lots of layers. A near-constant simmering soup pot and frequent bread baking help too.

I’m pleased to report that next year’s garlic has been planted in the arugula (and grass and thistle) bed. Garlic is a fall-planted crop in our climate; we typically plant it in mid-October and harvest it the following July. Our good friend and farming mentor Lara generously donated this seed garlic to Quiet Farm; one of the many cool things about garlic is that it adapts to the microclimate in which it’s planted. This means that within a few years Quiet Farm will grow entirely unique garlic, which we’ll then pass on to other farmers. (If you live in the Lafayette/Boulder/Louisville area, you should join Lara’s CSA next year. She’s an amazing farmer and has taught us so much, and she grows truly spectacular vegetables and herbs. We think the world of her.)

Look at our gorgeous pine-and-fir floors!

The Quiet Farmhouse Major League Very Serious Renovation Project is kicking off with a vengeance, and we started by refinishing some vintage hardwood floors. We were disappointed to only find salvageable floors in a small part of the original 1901 house, but we opted to save what we could. The floors had been dark stained and then used as a careless dropcloth for later painting projects, and they were in rough shape. We’re so pleased with how the sanding and refinishing turned out, but now comes the difficult decision of what sort of flooring we’ll install in the rest of the house.

Government paperwork is good for insomnia.

Another task on our to-do list recently has been to apply for a season extension grant through the NRCS. There is lots to learn about applying for grants as a small start-up farm, but we’re hopeful that this grant will assist us in building hoop houses (also called high tunnels) to extend our growing season. We’re quite lucky because, unlike many other programs for small farmers, this grant will still be funded whether or not our government manages to pass a new Farm Bill before they go on yet another unnecessary vacation or campaign trip or whatever it is they do while not doing their jobs. (And on that note, please could everyone remember to vote in the upcoming midterms? Astonishingly, only 37% of eligible voters managed to make time for this in 2016. Your small farmers thank you.)

Pumpkin spice what?

While avoiding the news I’m diligently testing recipes for my “Fall Treats” class this week at Broomfield Public Library. Though I’m not at all a fan of sugar, especially the quantities consumed in the average American diet, I think an occasional homemade indulgence might be permitted. This here is a chile-spiced brittle with pecans and toasted pumpkin seeds, and I’m looking forward to sharing it with you. We’ll taste curried pumpkin soup and other delicious fall things, too. Not registered yet? Go here!

This week I’m in seed school and N is painting our walls. We hope to have positive irrigation news for you next week, and I hope to see many of you in class on Wednesday evening!

Hello there! It’s officially autumn, although you wouldn’t know it from our weather; it’s still hot and dry. Everything feels crispy and parched and we’re hoping desperately for some moisture from a Pacific hurricane system this week.

We’ve got lots of projects underway at the farm. Here are a few things we’ve been up to:

Our living room in a state of disrepair.

Although our farmhouse is livable, it needs a lot of work. N tore up all of the carpet but kept it intact so we could donate it. We had hoped to find hardwood floors underneath and although we did find some in the older portion of the house, we’ll have to install new floors on most of the main floor. Our renovation list grows by the minute.

It’s canning season!

An experiment: fermented green hot sauce.

Obviously we didn’t have our own garden this summer, so I was excited to unpack my canning supplies. Our grocery shopping options are extremely limited here, so preserving local produce now will make our winters much more pleasant. I put up a hundred pounds of tomatoes and forty pounds of apples in various formats, plus roasted and froze plenty of green chiles. The onions will keep in a cool, dry place; eventually we’ll have a root cellar of sorts for all of our long-keeping vegetables. I feel calm and confident when I have a full pantry.

Perennial seedlings for next spring.

In addition to growing vegetables on our farm, we also need to rebuild perennial beds around the property. I’ve started perennial herbs from seed to see if I can keep them alive over the winter and plant them when the ground thaws in spring. This would be better done in a true greenhouse, but it’s worth a shot. Here you can see English thyme, winter savory and Greek oregano, all useful both in the kitchen and (hopefully) as deer repellent.

This week we’re tackling our irrigation system because we’re hoping to call for water next Monday! We’ll also get our old hardwood floors refinished and it’s Applefest this weekend, so there’s a lot going on in our tiny world. Have a great week!